A senior Ukrainian government official told The Washington Post that Kyiv doesn’t have the resources to pull off a big counteroffensive in the coming months as Ukraine is lacking skilled troops, munitions, and other equipment.
“If you have more resources, you more actively attack,” said the official, who spoke to the Post on the condition of anonymity. “If you have fewer resources, you defend more. We’re going to defend. That’s why if you ask me personally, I don’t believe in a big counteroffensive for us. I’d like to believe in it, but I’m looking at the resources and asking, ‘With what?’ Maybe we’ll have some localized breakthroughs.”
The official said Ukraine doesn’t have “the people or weapons” to pull off a counteroffensive. “And you know the ratio: When you’re on the offensive, you lose twice or three times as many people. We can’t afford to lose that many people,” the official said.
The Post also spoke with a Ukrainian battalion commander who went by the name of Kupol and detailed the grim situation on the frontlines. Kupol said his battalion previously withdrew from the town of Soledar, which is near the eastern city of Bakhmut, and came under Russian control in January.
Kupol said of his battalion of 500 troops, 100 were killed, and about 400 were wounded, leading to a complete turnover. He’s now being sent soldiers with no combat experience and very little training. “I get 100 new soldiers,” Kupol said. “They don’t give me any time to prepare them. They say, ‘Take them into the battle.’ They just drop everything and run. That’s it.”
“Do you understand why? Because the soldier doesn’t shoot. I ask him why, and he says, ‘I’m afraid of the sound of the shot,’” he added. The Post report said that Ukraine has sent in an influx of draftees to replace more experienced soldiers who have been killed or wounded. It said that as more Ukrainian men who didn’t volunteer fear they will get called to battle, Ukraine’s security services shut down Telegram accounts that were helping Ukrainians avoid locations where authorities were handing out draft slips.
Kupol said Ukrainian forces are also fighting with very little ammunition. “You’re on the front line,” he said. “They’re coming toward you, and there’s nothing to shoot with.” The Kyiv Independent also recently spoke with Ukrainian soldiers who said they were fighting without much ammunition, training, and support.
Ukraine is taking heavy losses in its battle defending Bakhmut, but it’s keeping a tight lid on its casualty numbers. A German official said including dead and wounded, Ukraine has suffered 120,000 troops, but the number could be much higher.
Despite the dire conditions for the Ukrainian troops, Kyiv is still sending untrained soldiers into what has become known as the “meat grinder” in Bakhmut. Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of Russia’s Wagner Group, said Sunday that Ukraine was “supplying endless reserves” and that fighting was getting fiercer as Russian forces are trying to push through to the western part of the city.
“including dead and wounded, Ukraine has suffered 120 000” -a year ago Zelensky announced that Ukrainian army is one million. Where are all those soldiers?
But there are good new too. The sanctions at last started to work. Some banks collapsed.
Yeah, SVB. More to come as the derivatives eat more banks.
All sanctions do is hurt the masses. And give the leaders an excuse for being lousy leaders.
Look at NK?
Look at Cuba?
60 years of sanctions to try and rid it of communism.
Result?
Cuba is still communist and embargo has cost Cuba (according to the UN) over 2% of it’s GDP per year.
Economic sanctions do NOT work.
Cuba has a lot of American cars,the wonders of my youth,1957 Chevys etc.
It’s great what a 60 year blockade can do, isn’t it?
“…the average Cuban has a lousy, standard of living.”
Perhaps, compared to the US- but compared to an awful lot of the world, the Cuban people live in relative luxury. They have 24-hour electricity, food, clean water, health care, housing… all which much of the world doe NOT have to any degree.
Strawman argument.
Go and ask the average Cuban if they like the sanctions or not.
According to the UN?
The embargo has cost Cuba over $130 billion dollars. That is over 2% per annum.
That might sound small. But remember? America’s GDP for the last 15 years has only once been over 3%. Take 2% from that and you are almost into a recession.
2% GDP reduction is a big thing…macroeconomically speaking.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/03/cuba-us-embargo-must-end
a) we know for a fact that the embargo IS hurting the Cuban economy.
b) and the point of the embargo was to end communism in Cuba. It did not.
By every measure…the embargo was a failure.
Beware, “The Washington Post reports Ukraine is short of skilled troops, munitions, and losses are growing” doesn’t mean we will negotiate. It means “send us your sons and daughters to die for NATO in Ukraine.” Imagine the worst possible episode of Let’s Make a Deal. (Sarcasm alert)
Or Howie Mandell’s show, “Deal or No Deal”.
The US in its infinite wisdom has stuck its future into a powder keg and an explosive situation,How it ends is anybody guess. Most of the world is peaceloving and only wants to coexist. There are a few exceptions, mostly the US and Israel warring for no apparent reason.
Well once the elites have all the money they need, lol, they need something else to focus their illusions of grandeur on.
More yachts. Ask Betty Voss. (seen her summer home?)
Yeah,sure. Hezbollah and Iran love peace,China loves Tibet and Taiwan, Mexican drug cartels love peace,Sudan loves its Christians, Russia and Ukraine love each other, India and Pakistan love each other,Burma loves peace.
“LOSEING PEOPLE” or LOSER PEOPLE?”
How did Ukraine make the leap from being a normal people to losers. Are they losing their people…??? OH YES!!! they are losing people in the millions. Latest estimate. But how did they get conned into provoking the best armed country in the world to invade them,,????
It would be easy to write their embrace of the idea of forging ahead toward Russian red lines on inferior inlectual capabilities of their people, but we see the Audtralians in the news today as they set off on a frightenly similar path with China which make’s one wonder who was the pie popper who lured them into toying with the second best armed state on the planet….????? We know the names of those who encouraged Ukraine to set out on this suicidal quest, but the names of the movers who were able to put our five eyes ally down under are not widely known, and hardly recognizable here in the West. Perhaps some Australian’s who frequent this site could point us here to some good source. Thanks in advance.
At some point a light bulb will go on and Ukraine will realize the west doesn’t give a rat’s ass how many Ukrainians die.
Kiev, at Washington’s bidding, insists on trading Ukrainian lives for upvotes on Tik Tok. I’m not sure, but something tells me that’s not a very good deal.
negotiate you fools. What else can you do?
That train left the station. Twice.
In other words:
‘Give us more stuff, NATO.’
Reality pokes its nose under the tent. You know it’s become obvious when government officials start saying it and the Washington Post starts reporting it. So what schemes are the neocons pitching to Biden now that they’re out of Ukrainian bodies? Polish bodies? US bodies? More and bigger missiles? What new wunderwaffen are they putting on the transparencies? A-10s? Long range HIMARS? Tactical nukes?
Some U.S. bodies are there. Some came home in body bags.
I am assuming F-16’s and Abrams tanks are next on the shopping list (amongst others).
They get fries with the F-16s.
A vanilla malt too!!??
Too many chiefs and not enough Indians?…I’m part Comanche, so I can say that without getting my a– kicked.
“Big counteroffensive?” Propagandists for Ukraine have sold as “counteroffensive” actions ranging from tens of thousands attacking down to just a few hundred attacking, from many brigades down to a company level action.
They are all counterattacks. They are not all the same thing, as they have been sold for so long.
I think I’ve found the solution. We have literally hundreds of thousands of military aged men illegally entering the U.S. who need gainful employment. Ukraine needs military aged men for short term military duty. Bam! Perfect use of resources! Prove me wrong! 🤣
Number of people illegally entering the US: Zero.
The US Constitution (Article I, Section 9, Article V, and Amendment 10) forbids the federal government to regulate immigration.
And as John Marshall said, “a law repugnant to the Constitution is void.”
Wait, are we enforcing the Constitution now? What about #1 and #2?
Oh, and you can pay my share of the taxes to support them. You’re welcome. 🤣
The presumed relevant part of Article I, Section 9 expired in 1808, and Article V concerns amendments. Amendment 10 seems to be countered by:
Article I, Section 8-
“Congress shall have power
4) To establish a uniform rule of naturalization”
… which apparently grants congress authority over establishing citizenship for anyone not born in the US, though I don’t know how that makes someone otherwise illegal, but of course the Constitution is in modern times just a set of guidelines anyway.
Article I, Section 9 didn’t “expire.” It forbade Congress to regulate immigration prior 1808.
Article V does indeed relate to amendments. And it specifically forbade any amendment to Article I, Section prior to 1808 to create a congressional power to regulate immigration.
So, yes, after 1808, the Constitution could have been amended to create a federal power to regulate immigration.
But it never was.
And as Amendment 10 makes clear, the power does not exist absent such an amendment.
I personally think lines on maps should be rivers and roads, but my impression of Article I, Section 9 is that they wouldn’t have explicitly forbade by Constitution proviso congressional exercise of a power not Constitutionally provided for. And Amendment 10 … do we even still do that one? But seriously, an effective Constitution requires an ethical judiciary, which requires ethical politicians to select them, which requires an informed and ethical electorate to select the ethical politicians. We might as well be debating angels dancing on pinheads.
“Washington Post reports Ukraine is short of skilled troops, munitions, and losses are growing”
New York Times denounces Washington Post as menace to vital US interests, urges government intervention.
For some reason, that made me laugh out loud! 😉
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/international-news/ukraine/the-ukraine-people-must-overthrow-zelensky-to-save-their-country/
The Ukraine People Must Overthrow Zelensky to Save Their Country
“Ironically, they began their manipulation of Ukraine in 2014. It was the Neocons, not the CIA with this plot. John McCain was there meeting even with the Neo-Nazis in public and promising the crowd that America will stand with them if they overthrow their government – Regime Change has always been their agenda. It has NEVER worked out even once – Vietnam, Iraq, Syria, Cuba, and Ukraine just to mention a few.”
If trillions of dollars are being exchanged behind the scenes while politicians are publicly extolling freedom-like virtues, successful regime change operations may be insignificant to most Neoconservatives and Liberal Interventionists.
Ukraine: We don’t have any able bodies, can we borrow some from you? We promise to return them back “like new”
I think you actually made a rhythm? 😉
I follow Seussian rule, how about you?
So it looks as if Douglas McGregor has been right on his assessment of the war. Nato and the U.S. will have to become even more actively involved(troops?) in order to keep the war going which could only lead to escalation. With the ‘leaders’ in the West unwilling to admit defeat they may go all in on prosecuting the war.
We should expect Ukraine would have this problem. It is normal.
The US Army in WW2 and Korea had huge problems with “replacements” that had to refill divisions that suffered over 100% casualties, in Italy, then Normandy and France, and then in Korea. That is what prolonged land combat does.
The Germans and Soviets and British had the same problems in those wars. Nobody was exempt.
We should expect Russia has had this problem too, especially in its smaller, more fragile “battalion tactical groups.”
In fact, Napoleon in his letters to his Marshals and son assumed huge losses to his divisions before they ever got to battle, calculating needed artillery on the basis of what infantry might ever make it that far. This is an old, old problem inherent in mass land warfare.
The armies of Frederick the Great and Gustavus Adolphus also documented this problem of replacements for regiments that had “won” but were destroyed. Long before, the problem got the name of Pyrrhic victory for an army that lost too many while “winning” a battle.
The cannon are getting harder to feed with more fodder being online. If I were a draft age Ukrainian I wouldn’t be sitting at home typing.
Did you see that report and picture recently of the sixteen-year-old boy in Ukraine who hung himself after he got a conscription notice? Very tragic.
Well, one difference is that the Ukraine is not even “winning,” let alone winning without scare quotes, any battles. The Kherson and Kharkov counter offensives can be considered Pyrrhic victories for the Ukraine, but what has been going on since, and in the central theater from almost the very beginning of the war, is that the Ukrainians have been forced back. They lost Mariupol. They lost Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk. They lost Soledar. They are losing Bakhmut. And, of course, even Pyrrhus, in the end, lost his war. So, while the problem is perhaps “normal,” it is not a good one to have, especially for the side that is ceding territory and cities. And that has a smaller pool of possible replacement troops than its adversary. Yes, all sides suffered “wipe outs” of various units in WWII, but the Allied side had a much bigger total population to draw on for replacements than did Germany and its allies. So, even if Russia is having this problem too (and I wonder if that is even true), it is not really similar.